


Never Be Lonely

by mikafell



Category: ATEEZ (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Angst, Choi Jongho Best Boy, Fluff, M/M, Only rated T for swearing, a few nights ago I put hongjoong's cover of black or white on loop, blacked out then came to with this in my google drive, but that's what it felt like, but then, not actually, singer!Jongho, they're all Children let them live, writer!San
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-24
Updated: 2020-06-14
Packaged: 2021-03-03 02:54:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,428
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24357655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mikafell/pseuds/mikafell
Summary: At 18 years old, San is a tangled mess of feelings that he used to write to let out. These days he bottles and nurtures his pain to feed his habit of creating short fiction. Relief comes in the form of Choi Jongho.---aka I'm bad at summaries but basically San has a long complicated history with being a little weird and not very emotionally wise. He meets Jongho, who makes him happy, then sad, then the happiest he's ever been.
Relationships: Choi Jongho/Choi San
Comments: 3
Kudos: 59





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> what the fuck did I just write  
> (small warning for names written in the order given name family name because this takes place in America)

In seventh grade, San went through a phase where he described feelings with nouns. He mostly did it to feel special, so people would think his mind was unique, but it also just made sense. Some days he felt like leaves on the sidewalk in late autumn - a little busy, a little distracted, a lot sinking into something familiar. Other days he felt like ice cubes in an empty glass - mostly pensive but the slightest bit cheeky. The good friend that he was, Yunho took his half baked metaphors in stride, even though no one in the world associates the same emotions with a given image, a fact San realized a year later.

“Hey, San.”

“Hey. How are you?”

“Good. You?”

“Mmm. Blue watercolors.”

“I see.”

Now, four years later, even with all the old habits Yunho makes fun of San for, he never brings up the nouns. San figures he should be thankful. He can only take so much cringing before his face freezes into a permanent expression of regret.

“It’s just so dumb! I’m writing a whole four page paper about there’s not enough information for me to form an argument because no one cares enough to have done any research on the topic.”

“Sipsipsip.”

“Kindly fuck off, Yunho.”

“That’s the tea, sis.”

But despite the years of growth and maturity, his inability to explain emotions like a normal human being clung to him like fuzz from a shedding sweater. So he wrote. He spun images out of text, 1000 word clips of life, and he hoped desperately to be able to make someone feel that exact feeling that had been hanging on the back of his heart. Maybe, he thought, if he could just be good enough, he could make people understand.

In eighth grade he crafted a piece about two friends who drift apart over a friendship of six years. It wasn’t autobiographical, San liked to joke that Yunho couldn’t get rid of him even if he tried, but it radiated a detached kind of longing, that feeling that life moves on and there’s nothing you can do about it, but maybe that’s alright. At least, to San it did. He never worked up the courage to find out what it made anyone else feel, but it won a national writing award so he figured it must have made them feel something.

Three years later he sewed a story out of mixed up patches of dialogue and near obsessive description. It told the story of coworkers with too much history who become friends on the train home. It reeked of confusion, apathy, and being on the edge of tears because everything is always just okay. At least, to San it did. At the request of an underclassman, he submitted it for the juniors’ edition of the Hamilton High Literary Magazine. Sitting with her in an empty classroom, cutting his work down to fit neatly on two pages, he didn’t even think to ask what the story made her feel. He only cared that his baby came out with all its fingers and toes. Two month later, though, she reported that her friends all told her his piece was their favorite, so he concluded that he must have done something right.

San feels happiness too, when Yunho barges into his room and crowds him into the corner of his twin sized bed, when he puts his headphones on and his favorite song on loop and dances around an empty house. But he never tries to write happiness. It’s too explosive, too expansive, too hard to capture in one place. Besides, no one needs help understanding his happiness. No one needs him to explain the feeling of lightness. At least, that’s how San feels. Instead, he bottles the twisted and tangled wisps of pain and yearning that float around his chest and hammers them until they’re solid and he can in a story. It doesn’t always make him feel better, but it makes him feel accomplished. Maybe, San thinks, if he just hammers long enough then someone will finally understand. And the process makes him hurt just a little bit more, but he feels special. And he feels understood.

“Then maybe the question is what do you want to do with your writing. Like, what’s the point?”

“I dunno it’s like. I’m not writing stories, really. I’m writing feelings.”

“Please don’t take this the wrong way, but that sounds really rehearsed.”

“It is! Ms. Golden asked me the same thing when we were freshmen and I was just like uhhhh so I had to come up with an answer in case anyone asks me again. Now stop being a meanie and give me some gummy bears!”

“Not until you finish your college apps.”

“Yunhoooooo.”

“No.”

“Stop eating all the yellow ones!”

Surprisingly, relief comes in the form of a round faced boy in a tailored wool overcoat. A transfer student one year younger than San and Yunho, Jongho Choi introduces himself by standing in front of the sign ups for acapella auditions for a solid fifteen minutes before putting his name in the 4:30 slot. San is immediately enamoured. In fact, he’s so intrigued that he puts his name in the time slot for 4:15, even though singing in the shower is just about the full extent of his experience. After a little bullying, San convinces Yunho to sign up for the slot at 4:45. It’s their senior year, he whines. They’re supposed to try something new. Yunho grumbles that he wanted to try out for cheerleading but relents.

When San walks out of the music room that Friday, more than a little embarrassed about his unfamiliarity with his voice but satisfied with his rendition of Youth, it’s only 4:23. He peers up and down the hall, but there’s not a Jongho in sight. He decides to wedge himself between the music stand with the “High Notes Auditions” sign on it and a row of lockers. It’s not weird that he’s hiding outside the music room. He’s just waiting for Yunho. Not weird at all. 

When Jongho appears five minutes later, San is folding a crane out of the paper he found in his pocket, so he doesn’t notice the younger until he’s standing over him, head tilted in curiosity. 

“You okay?”

San starts. “Huh? Yeah”-he smiles sheepishly-“I’m waiting for a friend.”

Jongho nods, then plops down on the floor next to him. His eyes are trained on the ceiling, mouth slightly parted like he’s trying hard to remember something. His eyes really are very round, San notes. It makes him look younger than he is. His broad figure and fashion choices ruin the illusion, though. And he smells faintly fruity, kind of like that perfect coconut popsicle he’d had in fifth grade but never been able to remember the brand of. And as comforting as the smell is, it only makes San more confused about the kind of person Jongho is.

“Jongho?”

The boy tears his eyes away from the ceiling to blink at San like he’s surprised San is still there, then scrunches his eyebrows together. “Sorry,” he says, “Remind me what your name was?”

San chuckles. “I’m San,” he says. Then, pointing towards the sign up sheet taped next to the sign announcing auditions-“We haven’t met. I read your name on the schedule.”

Jongho lets out a quiet ‘ah.’ He spreads his hands out on his knees - strong hands, San notes.

“You’re trying out for High Notes?” San asks. The answer is obvious, but he’s never been good at small talk.

Jongho nods affirmative, then-”Is High Notes some kind of drug pun?”

San laughs, loud and high pitched. The sound rings and echoes down the empty hallway. “That’s a very good question,” he replies, giggling. Jongho still has a perfectly straight face, which only makes San laugh more.

Before San can collect himself, Jongho glances down at his watch, then hurriedly pushes himself up. “Shit, I have to go in.”

San takes a deep breath, tries to contain his laughter into a too wide smile. “Good luck!” he calls after him, but Jongho is already heading into the music room. From what he can hear through the door, though, Jongho won’t need it.

San, Yunho, and Jongho all get a callback, then are invited to join the group, but Yunho declines because he secretly did try out for cheerleading and passed with flying colors (San pouts for a week about Yunho ditching him for hot girls, but in reality he’s insanely proud and knows Yunho is too busy long distance pining for one of the graduated seniors to be hitting on his teammates). Unfortunately, this leaves San alone as the only one in the group who doesn’t even know what vocal technique is. Luckily, Jongho’s patience is endless.

“See, you shouldn’t be lifting your shoulders like that. Breathe more from your stomach.”

San tries again, but stops half way through, wincing at how panicked he sounds.

“You don’t have to breathe so low,” Jongho says, smiling reassuringly. “Your lungs aren’t actually in your stomach. Just take a deep breath and try to expand from here.” He places a hand over the base of San’s ribs. San’s throat constricts a little at the touch. He’s not sure he’s going to be able to sing like this.

“You have such nice fingernails,” he says instead, taking Jongho’s hand into his. Even if he’s stalling, it’s true.

“I keep them short for guitar,” Jongho says shyly.

San gapes. “You play guitar?” He pulls Jongho’s hand to his chest. “Will you play something for me? Please?”

Jongho gives him the tiniest of closed lip smiles, but San knows it’s genuine because the smile in his eyes is ten times the size. “Maybe at my house sometime.”

San pumps a triumphant fist in the air. “Hell yeah.”

Jongho takes his hand back, then punches San lightly in the shoulder. “Alright, Mario. Let’s get you some breath control first, yeah?” Jongho may not laugh often, but San can hear the laughter in his words. 

That night, San tries, for the first time, to write contentment. In his mind, quiet scenes surrounded by snowfall unfold like blooming flowers. A girl and a boy, friends since their first memories, stop at a convenience store on the way home from school. Wrapped in colorful scarves and clashing jackets, they choose their drinks, then walk the rest of the way home, contemplating books they’ve just read, the possibility of a championship win for their soccer team, how they’ve known each other so long that just the sound of each other’s footsteps feels grounding. Neither of them say a word.

“Okay, but back to your nails, how are they so nice? Usually people who cut their nails short get really stubby nails.”

“I file them sometimes?”

“Wouldn’t that just make them shorter?”

It’s a Saturday afternoon in November when San peers over the edge of his bed to where Yunho is lying on the floor asks, “What perfume do you think Jongho uses.”

Yunho scrunches his nose. “I dunno. He probably just uses old spice like the rest of us.”

“He smells too good for old spice!”

“Not all of us spend all day sniffing Jongho.”

San throws a pillow at him for that. It misses him by a mile, sailing cleanly over him and the rest of the room to land near the door. “I don’t sniff him, I’m just sensitive to smells.”

“Sure, Jan. Sipsip.”

“Shut it!”

Whatever it is that makes Jongho smell the way he does, the scent quickly becomes ingrained in San’s mind as the smell of comfort. Home is a cold tropical perfume and his writing becomes fixated on smells. Suddenly the smoke can be a symbol of warmth and his characters are constantly surrounded by the scents of old friends and ex lovers because they wore popular brands of deodorant. 

San never encounters anyone who smells like Jongho.

And that’s the thing about Jongho. San has never met anyone so hard to give a type. He’s seventeen years old but carries himself like he’s lived for twenty-eight. He’s licenced to drive a motorcycle but babies everyone he’s close with, dresses like a CEO so rich he could buy San’s life out from under him but always seems to have time in his day to help the people who ask for it. And he’s bad at math, so bad at math.

“Why are you so good at multiplication but so bad at algebra,” San complains.

“I don’t know,” Jongho says, throwing his hands into the air. “I didn’t ask for x to stand in front of the numb-” He’s cut off by the shush of a passing librarian. “In front of the numbers,” he finishes in a whisper.

“You’re so cute,” San coos. He reaches out to pinch Jongho’s cheeks, but hesitates before he can touch his face. As much as San enjoys skinship, it’s not really something he and Jongho do. He’s never seen Jongho hug anyone and Jongho’s never initiated physical affection, and he doesn’t want to pass any boundaries without asking. But San’s never been good at asking.

Jongho slams his head onto the table, forehead rubbing against the quadratic formula. “I swear I learned this last year,” he groans. “Why can’t I figure it out.”

“You’ll get it,” San reassures him. “But you should probably get someone else to help you. I’m not so great at math either.”

And Jongho does. He recruits a pretty senior in AP calculus named Yeosang. San only talks to Yeosang once, but he thinks he’s pretty nice, if a little ridiculous.

“Hey, Yunho. Do you know Yeosang?”

“Not really, no. Why?”

“It’s not important. I was just wondering.”

“He’s the one tutoring Jongho, right?”

“Yeah.”

“I think Hongjoong was friends with him. I can ask if you want.”

“No, it’s fine.”

“You sure?”

“Just focus on trying to flirt. That’s probably enough.”

“Wow, rude?”

High Notes’ first performance is at an end of term event, a combined recital with the school’s bands and choirs and orchestras. They sing a couple plucky songs that make San feel like he’s in an 80’s boy band and one haunting ballad where Jongho belts high notes, the only sign of effort being the crinkle in the bridge of his nose. Yeosang is in the crowd, so after the show he meets Jongho at the door to backstage with a rose. San floats awkwardly in the doorway until he spots Yunho and latches to his side. Yunho praises their steady harmonies while San rubs his face in Yunho’s sweater. It’s fluffy and smells faintly of Tide laundry detergent - a very Yunho smell. 

“Is that Yeosang?” Yunho asks, when he notices that San isn’t listening to his compliments. San nods. He’s probably getting stage makeup all over Yunho’s sweater, but he can’t bring himself to care. A little foundation won’t hurt, but the sinking feeling in his stomach does. 

Yunho brings a hand to the back of San’s head and presses a soft kiss into his hair. He doesn’t say anything else. San is grateful to have Yunho as his best friend.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I said I had the whole thing written, and I do. But I didn't account for the fact that I'd forget to post the next update.

San has never tried to write jealousy before. It’s such a sharp directional emotion that he doesn’t know how to make it fit his style. It also makes him feel like a bad person. No one needs to know about the gnawing he feels in his stomach just from seeing Jongho smile. No one needs to know what a bad friend he is.

San still doesn’t really know Yeosang, just exchanges greetings with him in the hall because they have Jongho in common. Mostly he just sees the way Jongho laughs when San spots them in the library together, the way they seem to share a dry sense of humor and an air of maturity beyond their years. Mostly he sees the fondness Jongho says Yeosang’s name with, the way his strong hands curl delicately when he talks about him. 

San supposes it makes sense. With a sharp jawline, prominent features, and earnest eyes, Yeosang is the kind of gorgeous a boy can only be by having a certain disregard for gender norms. From what San’s heard, he’s incredibly kind. He’s definitely smart. And Jongho is Jongho. He’s good looking in that sweet boy next door kind of way, but so physically strong he actually sounds threatening when he jokes about wanting to fight. He’s witty and a fast learner and an even harder worker. And he cared. Despite being older, San can’t think of a single moment where Jongho stopped taking care of him. Now, watching Jongho and Yeosang huddle over Jongho’s textbook, San wonders if Yeosang will be the person Jongho finally lets take care of him.

Secretly, San has always hoped he’d be the one to take care of Jongho. He’d just taken too long to work out how.

“San, are you free after school today?”

“Beside homework, yeah. Why?”

“Can you help me work on the last verse of Winter Wonderland? I think I’m going flat in the middle.”

“Sure. You should record yourself. I always find mistakes I can’t hear when I record myself.”

“Ah. It’s not the same.”

In early January, just after they’ve returned from winter break, San lets Jongho read one of his stories. It’s the one about the women on the train. San curls his knees into his chest and plays with his bedspread, trying not to watch Jongho as he reads. When Jongho finishes, he looks up at San and tells him it reminds him of a dream because of the way you can always remember how dreams made you feel but not what actually happened. The comment warms San more than it should.

“It’s all kind of depressing,” San tells him when Jongho asks if there’s any others he thinks he should read. He cringes a little at how sad that makes him sound. Jongho just smiles gently and says it makes sense because stories need conflict and he doesn’t think he’s ever read a story about being happy that people take seriously. Then he flops down on San’s bed and says that maybe that’s why he likes music. Music can be whatever you want. San thinks he might agree.

“Do you know Paris in the Rain?”

“No, but if you look up the chords I can probably play it.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, just give me a second to practice the transitions.”

I look at you now and I want this forever. 

I might not deserve it but there’s nothing better. 

Anywhere with you feels right. 

The next day, when San passes Jongho and Yeosang in the library, Yeosang is curled into Jongho’s side and Jongho is stroking his hair, whispering something only they can hear. San shuts down before he can hurt. He doesn’t cry.

The problem with the way San writes is that, before he can write a feeling into a story and make it go away, he first has to make himself feel it twice as strongly. San’s not sure he wants to feel like seeing Jongho and Yeosang tucked into each other ever again.

Instead, he writes about emptiness. He writes stories of people who can’t feel, people who don’t care and are happy to live like that. He writes little girls who watch their parents divorce but are already too far removed from the family to be affected. He writes men who fall in love and lose their partners every month but take it in stride and continue to love. He writes and writes, spitting out stories like they’ll fight away reality, but finishes none of them. He doesn’t know how any of them end.

Then, he sings. Even though the action, the idea, is permanently infused with Jongho, he sings because it’s become a part of his life he’s forgotten how to live without. These days, his head is always filled with music, and there’s nothing to do but let it out. Besides, singing makes him happy.

More than anything, though, it’s working on technique that saves him. He reduces the art to a science and loses himself in the details. He fills his minds with maps of where to breathe, picks apart harmonies, drags his voice over runs, carefully tunes every note. Then, when he’s done, he feels accomplished. He feels special. And he never has to look at the tangled wisps in his heart.

He thinks that maybe he’ll never have to write fiction ever again.

“San, you should try out for the solo.”

“You know I’d never beat you, Jongho.”

“Don’t say shit like that. Your technique is getting a lot better and you have such a unique voice. I think you’d fit this song really well.”

“Maybe.”

“I’m not trying out unless you are.”

“What? You can’t do that.”

“I can do whatever the fuck I want. You have a really beautiful voice, San. Don’t forget that.”

When the soloists are announced Jongho shakes San’s shoulders so hard he thinks his brain is going to come out of his ears. “I told you!” Jongho shouts. “San, you’re gonna be amazing.” 

Jongho’s excitement is so infectious, San almost forgets to be sad. Somewhere in the back of his chest a little hot spring of pride bubbles over.

“Hey, San. Are you feeling okay?”

“Huh? Why?”

“You just seem kind of tired.”

“See, this is what happens when I don’t wear makeup.”

“San, you don’t wear makeup.”

“I’m fine, Jongho. Probably just didn’t get enough sleep last night.”

“You should take a break. Let’s go shopping. I need a new guitar string.”

San is lying in bed debating whether or not it’s worth it to struggle through the rest of his math homework when Yunho bursts through the door yelling, “YEOSANG HAS A BOYFRIEND.”

San bites his lip and tries to push down the bitterness bubbling up his throat. “I know.”

“No no no no.” Suddenly Yunho is on the bed beside him, wrapping his arms around San’s shoulders and pulling him into his chest. “Not like that. Yeosang’s not dating Jongho.”

“What?”

“He’s dating someone called Wooyoung. They’ve been dating for a year.”

San finally breaks. His tears leave dark patches all down the front of Yunho’s mint green sweater. “Why does it matter,” he sobs. “Jongho’s in love with him. It doesn’t matter if they’re not dating, he still doesn’t-”

“You don’t know that,” Yunho says sternly, peppering the crown of San’s head with kisses. “It matters because you’re going to tell Jongho he’s the most beautiful person on earth and you’re going to ask him on a date. And if he does like Yeosang then you charm the pants off him because they’ve known each other for three months and you’re the most amazing person I know and anyone who doesn’t want to date you is stupid.” But San has never been very good at asking.

“San! Are you free today?”

“No, sorry.”

“Oh. Okay. See you tomorrow then?”

“Of course, Jongho.”


	3. Chapter 3

San Choi comes into Jongho’s life like a firework. He’s honest, wants nothing more than to show people all the sides of himself, a little weird, sits in odd corners and bounces between extremes like a child, and he lights up the whole world. He’s a storm of high pitched laughter and self doubt, constantly flying with the wind to the next great destination, and somehow Jongho was lucky enough to get snagged on his sleeve and pulled along for the ride. Somehow, Jongho gets pulled along long enough to get to know him.

San, Jongho discovers, once the lights and noise have fizzled out, is much more like the ocean than a firework. He exists in a constant state of push and pull, hiding layers and layers of unknown beneath his sparkling surface, but it only makes him more beautiful because he’s so full of life, has so much to give, has so many parts to discover and love. On most days he’s mellow and forgiving, but terrifying when angry, fearsome in his determination. He’s freedom and humid nights, warm hugs and over energetic dance moves, he’s a guiding hand that doesn’t even realize it’s leading you somewhere. And, like the ocean, he has to be cared for so, without asking, Jongho slides himself into that little space in San’s life and does everything he can do to keep San glittering.

San could probably come up with a better comparison. Because he’s a writer. Because he’s cool like that.

On second thought, scratch the whole ocean metaphor. It’s terrible. The point is that San is beautiful. The point is that Jongho was content with just sometimes being the center of San’s day. The point is that Jongho spends a whole four months losing himself in San’s sunshine smiles and making him laugh and taking up as much of San’s time as he can until suddenly San has no time to give.

“You’re not with San today?” Yeosang asks, sliding into the chair next to him. It’s a friday so, besides the librarians, they’re the only one in the library. 

Jongho shakes his head no. “He said he had something to do. I don’t know.”

Yeosang hums and lays his head on Jongho’s shoulder. Jongho shifts so that he can keep working without disrupting him. They settle into a comfortable silence, the heating and the scratching of Jongho’s pencil filling the space with gentle white noise. Yeosang chimes in every few minutes to correct Jongho’s calculations, his voice low and gravely, hardly there. It’s easy. Yeosang has always been easy.

San is easy too, but it’s different. Where Yeosang is a steady rhythm of quiet study sessions and smearing melted ice cream on each other’s cheeks, San pulls him along on endless sprints of roadside dance parties and too long vocal lessons before finally stopping to catch his breath with wordless trips to the grocery store and days shut up at home. And then there’s the feelings. No matter how easy it is to get swept up in San’s friendship, the little nagging voice in the back of his mind will never let Jongho forget how gone he is for the boy. Jongho wonders, briefly, if in some parallel universe he and Yeosang end up being something like highschool sweethearts. 

Yeosang must be thinking something similar because he sighs and shifts off Jongho’s shoulder in favor of flopping onto the table.

“How’s Wooyoung?” Jongho asks, even though he already knows the answer.

“He’s still avoiding me,” Yeosang says into the wood.

“I’m sorry.”

“Thanks, I guess.”

Jongho’s not really sure what to say next, so he looks down at his worksheet and tells himself he’s working on the next problem even though his mind is full of fuzz. He’s never been good at comforting people.

Eventually, Yeosang says, “I just don’t understand.”

Jongho looks up. Yeosang is still laid out on the table, his face buried in his arms. “Understand what?”

Yeosang takes a while to respond, but eventually replies, “Why won’t he tell me what’s wrong? Or what I did? He just- who breaks up with someone over text? He couldn’t even call? What kind of asshole does that?” His voice cracks at the end, straining to keep steady. Jongho doesn’t have an answer for that. Instead he threads a hand through Yeosang’s hair, traces gentle circles behind his ear with his thumb, and pretends he can’t hear Yeosang crying. 

After a few minutes, Yeosang pulls himself back up, wiping away the remnants of his tears. “Sorry,” he says quietly. Jongho just digs around in his pockets until he comes up with a pack of tissues that he hands to a grateful Yeosang.

“It’s fine,” he says.

“It’s really not,” Yeosang says, dabbing the corners of his eyes, which are somehow not red or puffy at all. “You signed up for a math tutor, not to be a relationship counselor.”

“I thought we were friends,” Jongho pouts.

Yeosang laughs, his voice still a little hoarse and watery. “I guess we are.”

Jongho leans back with exaggerated satisfaction. “Exactly. Which means it’s my duty to watch you Not Cry and punch Wooyoung if I ever see him.” Then, because he thinks it might make Yeosang laugh for real-”Besides, if it doesn’t work out you can always date me.”

Yeosang raises an eyebrow at that. “Did you hit your head?” he asks, sounding genuinely concerned.

Jongho squawks in indignation. “Stop sounding so insulted! You’ve never thought about it?”

“No.”

“Fair.” He’d rather think about kissing San, anyway.

Jongho starts to wonder if there’s something he did to make San avoid him.

The fourth time San rejects Jongho’s request for help with a song he doesn’t actually need, Jongho’s finally had enough. “I’m sorry,” he calls as San is walking away.

San turns to him, eyes narrowed in confusion. “For what?” Wrapped in his puffiest winter jacket, San looks a little like a marshmallow in jeans. His black hair is mussed from running his hands through it too many times, eyelids a little droopy from too many hours of sitting. It’s all so mundane it puts Jongho at ease.

“I don’t know,” he admits. “Just. I’m sorry for whatever I did to make you think you have to stay away from me.”

San’s lips part but he doesn’t say anything, just stares at Jongho with an indecipherable wide eyed expression. Jongho has to look away. He stuffs his hands in his pockets, rubs his fingers over the broken pencil he left there two weeks ago. The lull of normalcy starts to wear away. As the seconds tick by like minutes and San still doesn’t speak, Jongho stops being able to pretend this is just another argument about Jongho taking San’s rants too seriously or San not taking himself seriously enough. “It doesn’t mean anything if I don’t know what I’m apologizing for, I know, but-”

“You didn’t do anything,” San interrupts.

“Then-”

San presses his mouth into a thin line. He schools his expression into one of indifference. “Can we talk about this not in the hallway?” As he speaks his eyebrows lift pleadingly. When Jongho nods, San sighs a tiny breath of relief. San had never been very good at hiding his emotions.

Jongho follows silently as San retrieves his backpack, then follows him to a bench near the edge of campus. Somewhere in the distance, the track team is yelling about one more lap. Jongho wiggles his feet in the snow, making little snow butterflies while he waits for San to talk.

When he finally does, he says, “I think I need space.”

Jongho’s mind grinds to a halt. San isn’t looking at him, but the words sound even and rehearsed. “You need space? From me?”

San nods, pressing his lips together so hard they turn white.

“Why?”

“Can I tell you something?” San glances up at him and he looks scared. Jongho has to resist the urge to reach out and comfort him. He grips the bench, fingers going numb from the cold. He should probably say something, hopes he’ll say something, nod at least, tell San that he can tell him anything, anything at all, and Jongho will help him work through it. He doesn’t know if he moves at all, but eventually the corners of San’s mouth twitch up into a cruel smile and San says, “I like you.”

What?

“A lot.” San leans back, looking a little crazed, a lot lost. “Oh my god,” he whines. “There has to be a way to explain this without sounding like a third grader. Like, I wanna date you? And hold your hand? And-”

And Jongho laughs. He buries his face in his hands and laughs a full bodied uncontrolled laughter because he feels like he’s living the plot of a chick lit coming of age book and there’s no way this is actually happening. 

“Are you laughing at me?”

Jongho shakes his head. “No. Maybe? I’m not sure.” There’s no way this is his real life. “This is all just so goddamn”-he lifts his head-”ridiculous.” And suddenly he’s an inch and a half away from San’s face and wow this really is something right out of a movie.

San’s eyes are fucking sparkling.

Jongho’s never been fond of skinship, reserves it for people he can’t think of any other way to help. He used to imagine that one day, when he had a girlfriend, he might hold her hand or let her lean into his chest while they watched movies. When he realized he liked boys too, those possibilities expanded to maybe straightening his boyfriend’s hair, maybe hooking his chin over their shoulder from behind. But it had never felt real to him. It felt like he was playing out a script in his mind - Things You’re Supposed to Do When You’re a Boyfriend. Now, though, his body moves without him telling it to, carefully wrapping his arms around San and pulling him closer until he can feel his warmth through the layers of winter clothes.

“I’m not giving you space,” he says. “I’m never giving you space.” And oh, the sparkling in San’s eyes must have been tears because he can feel where they’re falling on exposed skin above his collar. Jongho pulls San even closer, buries his face in the crook of his neck, whispers, “I’m never giving you space because I’m taking you on a date. We can- I don’t know where I want to take you yet but I’ll figure it out but I promise you’ll love it and I’ll take you on so many more and I’ll never make you cry again, I promise, and I’ll work so hard to make you so happy so you never have to feel lonely. And when it gets warmer we can go to the beach like you’ve always wanted to-” and fuck, because Jongho thinks now he might be crying, too.

Before he can completely break down, Jongho pulls away. He cups San’s cheeks in his hands, wipes away his tears with his thumbs, lets his hand fall down to San’s shoulders, rubbing them through his marshmallow coat.

“San, will you be my boyfriend?”

To be honest, neither of them really knows what they’re doing. Neither of them have dated anyone before (dating in middle school doesn’t count). It works out, though, because since neither of them have any expectations they can do whatever they want. A week after San’s confession, Jongho invites him over to his house and calls it a date. He kicks his parents out of the house, cooks dinner, plays guitar while San sings along. It’s nothing they didn’t do when they were friends, there’s just more kissing (and god does Jongho like kissing San. They haven’t gone further than lingering brushes of lips but every time they kiss something warm settles in Jongho’s chest and he feels like he could live with his mouth against San’s). Two days later, San tackles him during lunch and demands a turn at date hosting. They fill a box with overpriced macarons for San’s mother and spend an hour touring music stores, testing every piano. The next week, San emails him the story of their date.

The promises Jongho made on that first day are bogus. They both know it. It’s impossible to be happy all the time. They fight - about the days San still needs to shut himself in his room alone and how Jongho seems to have a single romantic bone in his whole body. Jongho twists his ankle, San loses his voice, they both still don’t know what they’re going to do when San graduates and Jongho is still stuck in Hamilton. Life happens and they fuck up, but Jongho thinks that, as long as San is there to hide his crutches on high shelves and draw trees on his cast, any amount of injury could be okay.

Sometime in early March, when Jongho has kicked his parents out of the house for probably the fiftieth time, San asks him a question he expected San to ask a long time ago.

“I don’t know,” he replies, lazily twisting the drawstrings on San’s sweatshirt around his finger. They’re sprawled out on the couch, San lying in Jongho’s lap with his sweatshirt bunched up so Jongho can see the smallest sliver of stomach. A few weeks into their relationship, Jongho realized that underneath all the oversized sweaters and button downs San was hiding an insanely toned body. Even with all his strength, Jongho couldn’t help but be a little jealous. He’d asked why San didn’t show it off more, to which San had just shrugged and said he likes feeling huggable. Not long after, though, San started adding more fitted outfits to his wardrobe, accentuating his small waist, his broad chest, the shape of his arms. Jongho wonders if he’s trying to tell him something.

“I think it’s hard to say when you start liking someone,” Jongho says. “But for a long time. I probably liked you the whole time.”

San jerks up and slaps him on the chest. “The whole time? And you just sat there and let me cry?”

“I’m sorry, I-”

“That’s not what I meant!” San huffs and flops back against Jongho, crossing his arms. “I guess maybe it’s not that big of a deal, but before we started dating you were probably hurting too. I never did anything to make you feel better.”

Jongho laughs. Sometimes when San is thinking too hard he starts talking with a pout and it’s one of the cutest things Jongho has ever seen in his life. “It’s fine,” Jongho says. He tucks some of San’s hair behind his ear. It’s getting long, probably long enough that Jongho could french braid the sides. He carefully measures out three bunches of hair. “Honestly, it was quieter for me. I think I just enjoyed being around you too much to worry.”

San worries at his lip. “Are you sure?”

Jongho abandons the braid and leans down to press a soft kiss to San’s forehead. “I’m sure.”

San shifts so that he’s sitting in Jongho’s lap. It’s a little awkward, painful when San accidentally pinches Jongho’s leg between his elbow and the couch, but once he gets there he leans in and whispers, “Kiss me properly?”

And what can Jongho say to that but yes?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and that's all

**Author's Note:**

> I apologize to anyone who's waiting on the second chapter of my woosan fic. I've been having writer's block of epic proportions. But! This one is actually complete already! So I'll be posting the next two chapters steadily. Please stay tuned.


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